Nintendo sometimes makes a big deal about milestones—Mario's 30th, Zelda's 25th, and the "Year of Luigi" are all recent examples that come to mind—but one thing you won't usually hear them mention is how long it's been since something went away. Luckily, my encyclopedic knowledge of pointless factoids stands at the ready! You see, today, February 19, 2019, marks the 25th anniversary of the very last games that Nintendo ever released for the Famicom, the system that enjoyed new releases for nearly 11 years and put them on the map as a home video game publisher. The two final Nintendo-published...

There's always much to do when it's discovered that some game system or another isn't region-free. The recent "revelation" that Wii U will also be region-locked has drawn no small amount of ire from the perpetual justice-seekers of the world who seem to think that such a move is without precedent. Of course, what's more uncommon is indeed a system that happens to be region-free by default. And wouldn't ya know it, literally every single home console from Nintendo has been region-locked in one way or another. Won't you take a look with me?! The early days In a sense, dating all the...

I can imagine it now: on April 12, 1991, Hiroyuki Hashimoto is drunk after a long cherry blossom viewing party with his new coworkers, who he pretends to like. He wasn't a good student but he was chosen by this company, so he's stuck here for better or worse. He could have been something more, but couldn't we all have? His duty is clear. With his first paycheck he has deigns on purchasing a new Super Famicom with some of this month's earnings, and he aches for Actraiser, Final Fight, and the upcoming SimCity, all components of the system's strong launch lineup. He already has the money in...

What is it about Punch-Out!!, really, that keeps me at it? I've been trying for the sake of an article to finish the gold cartridge Punch-Out!! for the better part of a week now, having crushed the first two of the game's three circuits with little trouble, but find myself now kind of stuck in the six-boxer final gauntlet: Rematches with Piston Honda, Bald Bull, Dan Flamenco, the annoyance of Soda Popinski, the frustrating Mr. Sandman, and SUPER MACHO MAN (he is macho). All I wanna do is see the ending the hard way, see if it's any different from the Mike Tyson version. But there it waits, burgering...

Take a look at these two games here. Go ahead, check them out! We have Hogan's Alley there on the left, and Duck Hunt on the right. Can you see any differences between them? I mean sure, Hogan's Alley has this strangely happy-lookin' cop holding a standard issue blue hippie-beater, and Duck Hunt has the goddamned hunting dog there looking way cuter than he ever does in the actual game, they are different games yeah yeah. But really look at them! Despite all the comments you could make about the slightly different purple tones, the vibrant quality of the printing, or the glossiness of...

If your childhood was anything like mine, you were rarely a stranger to a variety of bizarre schoolyard ramblings and rumors when it came to Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!! I remember hearing that Mike Tyson was literally unbeatable, that some boxers could get knocked out of the ring completely if you used the star punch at the right time, and that pressing certain sequences of buttons could charge up your health even after you'd already used the select button trick between rounds. That is to say nothing of the rumors regarding Mike Tyson himself, which it seemed every other kid had come to know with...

As I desperately scramble to acquire as much Famicom stuff as is humanly possible before I eventually leave the land of sushi-go-rounds and AKB48, I sometimes come across something that is weird enough to defy satisfying explanation. One of my recent acquisitions in that department was this strange Super Star Force cartridge. Clocking in at double the height of a normal Famicom game, this thing also bears a lot of other weirdness that caused me to pick it up for the relatively low price the seller was asking. Weirdness that is just enough to excite me! The astute might notice a few things...

As soon as I saw the weird, tendril-like metal coils, the large, molded handgrip, and the suction-cup button covers, I knew I had to have it. How could something so grotesque seem so exciting at the same time? Not something you play with on its own, the Ultech 3 requires you to bring your own equipment to the party, and this fits right on top of it. That equipment is one standard Family Computer control pad, and that party is about to get frisky. The box it comes in touts in huge letters that it's the "ONE HAND CONTROLLER," the "Ultech Machine!" The night after I buy it I let it sit in the box...

As I'm grinding out a season of Tecmo Super Bowl on my Famicom (which, ironically, plays host to a Japanese version of the game that is literally identical, text and all, to the U.S. release), I concretely decide on my literal future. I plan it out right there, as I blip video Phil Simms around on the screen. This is the power Tecmo Super Bowl has over me now, these ancient players, my perpetual heroes, and I find myself being mentally sucked away to 1991. As I hammer A to send that unmissable extra point through the uprights it all materializes before my eyes. I will grow up, enter the...